


The Peace Back Home

by misura



Category: Gattaca (1997)
Genre: Character Death Fix, Community: smallfandomfest, Everyone Thinks They're Together, M/M, Post-Movie(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-30
Updated: 2015-01-30
Packaged: 2018-03-09 17:20:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3258104
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misura/pseuds/misura
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wherein Jerome fails at everything except life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Peace Back Home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [neverminetohold](https://archiveofourown.org/users/neverminetohold/gifts).



> prompt: _Vincent/Jerome, a reason to wait_ (neverminetohold)

After perhaps two minutes of being surrounded by some very impressive and realistic looking flames, it occurred to Jerome that he was not, in fact, experiencing any sort of excruciating suffering one rather imagined to experience as part of the whole 'utter self-annihilation by way of fire' package.

He had hoped to be able to keep from screaming - to die chin up, chest out, so to speak. As far as _that_ went, he judged he was succeeding quite admirably.

Unfortunately, the rest of the plan seemed to be a bit of a cock-up.

(Well. Bloody story of his bloody life, wasn't it?)

 

"You're telling me he knew?" Jerome tasted tonight's wine. Miracle of miracles, it appeared to have been allowed to breathe - for very nearly an hour, if he was any judge.

"No," Irene said, but she sounded more thoughtful than certain. "I don't think Vincent is capable of imagining anyone to ... give up that completely."

Jerome groaned. "You're probably right. Lack of imagination, that's Vincent for you. Damn him."

"You love him," Irene said. "Don't you?"

Jerome swirled his wine. "Yes, well, there's rather a lot of that going around, isn't there? Anyway, I'd think he would have had the decency to tell me he'd secretly disabled the burner. What, he doesn't trust me anymore all of a sudden? Bit late for that, isn't it?"

"It still works. Just not for the purpose you wanted to use it for."

"Same difference," Jerome said. "So what's this I'm hearing about you moving, anyway? Got a big, juicy promotion attached to some job offer you can't refuse or something?"

"Or something." Irene stared at her wine. "I can't just hang around here for a year, waiting. I'm not you."

"Is that what you think it is I'm doing here? Mommy waiting for Daddy to come back home from work?"

Irene's hand was warm on his. "I'll write. Or call."

They'd be cold and distant and _careful_ letters, Jerome knew. He'd received rather a lot of them after his accident, all from friends and family, all so very careful to tiptoe around certain topics, to not mention his accident, or their own good fortune in not having suffered one.

"Do what you want. Just don't expect me to return the favor."

Vincent might mind, he thought. Coming home to find Irene no longer there. Might feel like he'd had his heart broken or something - the stupid fool.

Not Jerome's problem.

 

A truly determined person, a man possessed of a sharp intellect, great stamina, astonishing mental acuity and all the willpower genetic perfection might bestow upon him, would certainly have tried again. _If at first you don't succeed,_ and all that.

The good thing was that Jerome had already made all the necessary arrangements; Vincent would be able to pretend to be Jerome for the rest of his miserable but charmed life, if he so chose.

After his second bottle of wine, Jerome usually started considering burning the whole lot. The house, too. Everything. Force the ugly, distasteful truth out there.

He never actually went through with it. Of course.

People might think he'd died in an _accident_.

 

"Yeah, I think he talked about you sometimes," Jerome said, happily puffing on a fairly excellent cigar. "His asshole brother - that's you, I assume?"

Inspector Anton Freeman didn't even wince. Good for him. Jerome preferred to have a bit more of a challenge, anyway; weaklings who winced at the first hint their little brother might not be their biggest fan weren't worth the effort of baiting.

" 'I know I have no right to ask this of you, but would you keep an eye on him for me, make sure he doesn't get into any trouble? He's rather reckless and enjoys provoking people to the point of murderous rage, but really, he's a nice guy.' "

"He never," Jerome said. He felt a little shaken, all the same. A lot annoyed, too. "He never wrote that. To _you_? And what have you done for him lately? Arrested him for a murder he didn't commit?"

Freeman shrugged. "I may have paraphrased."

"You're a bloody liar." Jerome laughed. "He didn't write you a thing, did he? You're just messing with me. And you know what - you almost had me, too. How about that?"

"Jerome Morrow has no reason whatsoever to write to me," Freeman said. Admitting nothing out loud.

"You're darn right he doesn't. Want a drink?"

"A bit early in the day, isn't it?" Freeman said, which was a perfectly acceptable, serious-detective-with-a-stick-up-his-ass thing to say, except then he added, "You miss him that badly?" which was not.

"If you're going to be a sanctimonious prick like that, you can just get the hell out of my house."

Freeman left, so apparently, he didn't consider himself capable of _not_ being a sanctimonious prick. That about gelled with Jerome's own assessment of the man, so he figured it was just as well.

Vincent didn't need more than one of those types in his life, anyway, and while Jerome might not have gotten there first, he definitely wasn't going to clear the field for some low-life civil servant.

 

One year.

Quite a long while if you counted the days, the hours, the minutes. Vincent was probably having the time of his life - unless he'd been found out, of course, in which case he'd probably either been brigged or shoved out of an airlock.

Assuming airlocks were actually a real thing, capable of having people shoved out of them, instead of just something they'd conveniently invented for movies and TV. Jerome was no expert; he wouldn't know about such things. If he had, Vincent might have wanted to talk about them with him, which would have been an utter pain.

Jerome decided it really was a pity one couldn't literally die of boredom.

 

And then Vincent came back, big to-dos on all the news channels, and Jerome realized he was not sorry he'd stuck around long enough to see this circus.

"Hey." Vincent looked ... the same, more or less. Not sun-bronzed or anything.

"Hey." Jerome considered tossing out a 'welcome home, honey', just for the heck of it.

Vincent sat down - dropped down, nearly, space travel being an exhausting business, it seemed like.

"How was your trip?"

"Great," Jerome said. "Fantastic. Fabulous. Can't wait for you to take off again. How was yours?"

"Same," Vincent said, but he smiled as he said it, so Jerome figured he should take that statement with a grain of salt. "I wish you could have been there."

"Well, that makes one of you. Besides, I think they might have smelled a rat if there'd been two of you all of a sudden."

"This time, yeah." Vincent sighed and closed his eyes. "Next time, who knows?"


End file.
